His hey had drawn her attention, only enough to peek at him through the strands, and though she’d nodded, there’d been no verbal agreement on her end. Helping at the Tower was hardly boring, but if René needed a hand, even her smaller, daintier one, she’d lend it willingly. And when he spoke of his brother, her eyes had fallen, not to the necklace, but their makeshift castle with its water-less moat. There was an absurdity to all of this, particularly the sand castle building, yet it was calming nonetheless.
Ridley smoothed out the sand in front of her and drew a sad face with her index finger. “She never allowed me to give her gifts.” When she was alive. “She’d said it was the thought that counted, and the only gift she ever needed was me, even though I knew everything that she liked and when she had her eye on something.” Pause. Drawn hair, then, to accompany her sad face in the sand.
“I miss her, but...” She nibbled on her lower lip, thoughtfully. “Since she... I’ve been able to give her the things I never had the chance to, and bring her sweets and treats I knew she’d like. It won’t bring her back, but if it will make her happy, then I’d like to try harder.”
This time, when she tucked the hair from her face, there appeared a shy, fleeting smile, but a smile nonetheless.
“There it is,” he said in reference to her smile, and reached over to draw a face of his own. As he dragged his finger through the sand, he nodded in understanding. “You know what, how about when the bakery is up and running again, you come visit and I’ll teach you how to make one of her favorite treats. You can provide all the love we’ll put into it,” he proposed. It wasn’t something he often offered people, but he didn’t think twice about giving Ridley the chance to put even more thought behind her gifts.
The clumsy smile was promptly ruined when he tried replicating his beard, but he drew a stick figure body, hand reaching out to her drawing to make up for the obvious lack of artistic talent. Once done, he stood up and patted the sand from his hands onto his swimming trunks. Respectably clean, he extended a hand to Ridley and said, “Come on, let’s go put some water into this moat, I think the young gentleman over there would let us borrow his.”
When it became evident to her that what he was drawing was his facial hair, she tried not to laugh. All of it, ridiculous—but a sweet gesture, particularly when he joined their drawings together. Though Ridley had started off the day on a somewhat somber note, following her conversation with Quen, the infiltration of René and his sand castle had lifted her spirits, slow and steady.
There indeed was the issue was getting water into that moat, lest any mice decide to take up residence in their shoddy excuse for a castle, so the scholar wiped her hands into her knees, pulled her hair over a shoulder, and took the offered hand, using his weight to drag herself up to standing.